Lithuanian defence chief receives reassurance from German general about military technology purchase

BNS

Monday, February 23, 2015

Lithuania's Chief of Defence Major General Jonas Vytautas Žukas was on Monday assured by his German colleague, General Volker Wieker, that media reports about Berlin's alleged refusal to sell armoured trucks was incorrect.

In a telephone conversation, the German chief of defence "expressed concern over the misleading information that appeared in the media and personally assured that the German Defence Ministry has not made any decisions in this respect," Žukas' spokesman Captain Mindaugas Neimontas told BNS.

Lithuania's Defence Ministry has said that Germany's Krauss-Maffei Wegmann was one of the ten potential suppliers that offered its armoured fighting vehicles to Lithuania. Lithuania's government has said it was not holding direct talks with the German government and had no plans of starting such talks.

On Sunday, the German daily Die Welt reported that the German Defence Ministry had said that the country would not sell armoured vehicles to Lithuania in the next few years. It said that in the production of new armoured vehicles, priority would be given to the German armed forces.

Colonel Romualdas Petkevičius, the head of the infantry fighting machine project, told BNS on Sunday that Lithuania is still in the phase of analysing all received documents and "has not sent out any additional inquiries to the German government or the company in connection to the infantry fighting vehicles."

On the government level, Lithuania is holding talks with Germany on a possible acquisition of armoured howitzers PzH 2000. Lithuanian Defence Minister Juozas Olekas told a representative of the German government last week about the wish to purchase the howitzers, but did not receive a final answer.